9:34 Dragon, Autumn

A kick to the ribs wakes me, along with the words, Get up stupid. This is a normal morning for me. During the day, I will be kicked, punched, spit on, and humiliated in other ways. I won't get much for lunch, but after dinner, I will be pushed to the ground and ordered to sleep.

I have been transferred five times, always in shackles and usually drugged – these slavers have a good system. It is nearly impossible to escape. I say nearly, because a child escaped once. It was a girl, and she slipped through the ropes and the pens and into the darkness and we never saw her again. They put a head on a pike, and claimed that they got her, but it wasn't her head. It wasn't even a child's head. Oh, they tried to make it look like her, to try and scare the rest of us into not running, but it wasn't her. She got out. Maybe she lives still.

I have tried to escape six times. Every time, I have been chased down and beaten to unconsciousness. Every time, I have woken up with a healer's hand waving over me. I bet that I'll fetch a good price, because I've watched them kill scrawnier men for much less. I know why they feed me. I know why they chase me down and then heal me. It's not every day that you find a strong and healthy young man to sell. As soon as I am broken, that is.

We live in a pen like caged animals and are treated accordingly. Chained to the fence and to each other, our hands are bound and our feet are tied together in loops of connected rope. It's a smart move, I'll give them that. It's hard to run when you have to drag a dozen people with you, some of whom don't want to run. That last part is baffling – why would anyone not want to run?

There's a little boy seated next to me; he doesn't even have hair on his arms, yet. Maker, he's so young – what's he doing here? He doesn't shy away from me like the others, even though being around me tends to invite the attention of the slavers. But most others don't know what awaits them. Regardless of how we act, if we perform as instructed and are compliant with the rules, the same fate awaits us all. I've read all about it. I've sat with my father and uncle and listened to men tell stories about slavers; brave men who have escaped, brave men who hid along dirt roads as carts filled with women and children rolled by. Brave men that hid for a good reason. Yes, I know that I shouldn't talk back to the guards. I could avoid a lot of beatings if I bore their insults and accepted their scorn. It would make surviving this a little bit easier. But that's not me. I'm not going to let them treat me like a dog, because I am no dog. I'm a Vael.

This slavers ring is run by the Antivan Crows – I recognize the symbol some of them have stitched into their jackets. Slavery must be a lucrative business, because I grew up learning that the Crows value coin as well as notoriety. I wonder if that's the reason the Qunari keep their distance. In any case, I don't know what the Crows want with me. All of these others are just labor for their mines, indentured servants that will be shipped off wherever the Crows need them. I am certain that they don't know who I am. These are the kind of people that would throw that back in my face. No, their only requirement is to break me down so I can be sold. Or... I read once that the Crows recruit into their ranks from those they capture: men and women, even children. But I am no mercenary. I am no assassin. There's no honor in striking from the shadows. The slaver guards must know this about me, and while I am strong, I am more trouble than I'm worth. It's likely that they will try to get rid of me at some point, high profit or not. I am certain that if I don't prove compliant soon, they will sell me to Tevinter, and then some magister will turn my brain to sludge and the rest of me into whatever they want. I don't want to end up a mindless laborer... or worse. I have to keep trying. I have to get home.

There have been so many times that—when traveling, imprisoned, or infirm— I elected not to run, because it didn't feel right, but each time I did try to get away, I knew that I would get caught the instant that I started. We are kept weak, and the guards are kept strong, which is why I can't run fast enough. I tell myself to stay sharp, to listen, to wait for the right opportunity, but these are the Crows. Their mastery is preventing opportunities, and every day that passes, I know that my chances are running out.

A frumpy woman with a cart ambles to a stop in front of our pen, and upon her halt, the contents of the vat that she ferries sloshes unappealingly. She ladles some of it into bowls and hands it to the guards, who leer at her. They are so disgusting – is every woman just a repository for their sex? They thrust the bowls at us, and we have to stumble to catch them before their contents spill all over the dirt. It's a meager breakfast and it tastes like rotten oats in dirty water, but we all eat it anyway.

The guards sit down for their slop after taking shifts watching over us. The men outside our pen are talking in Antivan. A lot of what I used to know has come back to me since I've been around it, and they haven't figured out that I can mostly understand them. I've gotten to know their names, their families' names, their friends' names. I know when they eat, sleep, relieve themselves, what makes me them angry or laugh, which ones snore and which ones sleep as light as a feather. They start boasting about how many women they've "taken" in how many different cities, and how they visit each of them periodically. They laugh about how they brutalize these poor girls, violently filling their bellies with bastards. They talk about the men they've killed, the wild animals they've hunted, they boast of their kills as though the act of killing is an afterthought to the accomplishment of it. But I know that no man who brags about his accomplishments is as brave as he claims.

I think about my Sammie when they talk. I think about her slumped against that tree, the bruises on her legs and arms where that filthy mercenary's bare hands touched her. I use that anger. It's better food than this slop.

One of the guards turns to look at the boy, and I can feel him tense up. I glance over, and the fear in his eyes blankets me. It's like sitting too close to a fire pit, and I want to move away but I can't. I'm roped to him just like the woman on the other side of him. She shifts uncomfortably, and I will her to stay still. Moving gets their attention. Attention is death for the weak.

Stop movin' unless you want a sting, one of the guards says, cackling, and everyone around me freezes, their eyes turned downward.

A sting. That's what the guards call their throwing potions and they're very effective. Little yellow vials that easily shatter with pressure. The liquid stings like mad, paralyzing its target momentarily so that the guards can come close enough to administer a beating. Once you're incapacitated, it's hard to fight back.

The woman is breathing hard, and she closes her eyes. But I don't. I look at them. I'm always watching. The things they do to people here… Witnessing it, fighting against it, taking a beating in place of someone else… these are the things that happen to me when women in my pen move. I almost want her to move just so I can dish out as much as I get.

The little boy looks back down, his watery eyes leaking droplets onto the dry dirt. He's afraid. Fear is our worst enemy here. Just like in the swamp, fear will break you, and it will break you before the slavers do. It's hard to think clearly when you're afraid. I give him a very slight nudge with my elbow, and he nods his head once as though he understands. But what's there to understand? He's a child. None of this must make much sense to him.

After a short time, the guards turn away, but only because they need to begin the morning routine of transferring us to the mines. We are loaded into small carts, and the boy is taken on a different cart from me. I watch him go, wondering if he'll make it back up today; I am not sure that would be a blessing. Maybe it would be better for him to die rather than live like this.

Mules packed with supplies pull us down narrow and winding paths, the walls stretching up higher and higher the further down we go, entrenching us in the earth. We will be forced to haul rock out of the mine all day with few breaks. The guards work in shifts, standing around, pacing, their hands on their swords, their gazes on us.

The day turns late, and I am hauling a crate of rocks to a cart when a great rumbling from somewhere echoes up the ravine. At first, it sounds like it's coming from the sky but then the ground begins to shudder, little vibrations that rattle the pebbles and kick up dust. Then a jolt snakes beneath my feet like a lightning bolt in the dirt, and I stumble but catch myself. A few others nearby fall to their knees, dropping their crates and gripping their carts to keep steady.

Panic erupts in the forms of cries and groans, and our limbs flail for something solid, but as quickly as the rumbling dismantles us, it stops. The silence is more than I can stand, and I look around, finding similar sets of fearful expressions. Just as I am wondering if that was an earthquake or something, a cry canons up the canyon, bouncing off the rock and I can't quite pinpoint where it originated. There is one thing that is clear though: it's precursor to something terrible. Everyone around me seems to have that thought at the same time, and some fly for cover, ducking under their carts while the guards take shelter under their shields. I crouch under the nearest cart and from my vantage point, I can see down the rocky path, but what's coming doesn't look real.

Off in the distance, down the long entrenched path, I see the ground cave in, as though the earth is taking a deep breath, and then quite suddenly, everything that was drawn in is belched back out. Earth and stone and people go flying through the air like dolls from a child's hands. The resulting cloud of dust that billows up from the pathway rushes towards me, and it's all I can do to duck and cover my face. As much as I try, dirt still gets in my mouth.

The noise. It's like wind if wind could scream bloody murder. I cough compulsively, because the dirt in my mouth is sinking down my throat. Seconds drag, and the ground begins to shake in earnest, knocking even the strongest and most sure-footed of us flying, and sending us tumbling with the rest of the rocks. Some of the other captives have found something solid to anchor themselves to, but I am not so lucky and, eventually, I end up slamming shoulder-first against the rock face. Pain explodes like a whip has cracked against the tissues inside my shoulder, up my neck, down my side, across my chest.

Finally, after an endless river of noise and dirt and wind, the air calms and the earth's seizures recede. I push myself up with the arm attached to my good shoulder and look around.

Many are moving, albeit slowly, testing their bodies and the ground. Some have realized that the guards are not really paying attention anymore and start to move with haste. I scramble up, but a sharp shot of pain pierces my clavicle. Damn it! I can't have a broken shoulder! Not now! Others are now running by me as I struggle to move. I have to move. Damnit, Beenie, move!

Gasping for air, and with my chest heaving, I place one foot flat on the ground and push myself up. I drag the other foot in front of me, I wince, I grit my teeth, but something is really wrong with me, and I stumble back to my knees. Get up, you fool! You can't stop! Get up!

Someone small appears at my side, and their tiny hand hooks underneath my arm, trying to push me into motion and I look up. It's the boy! Maker in the Heavens… he looks like hell. His hair is standing straight off his head, like he was electrocuted or something. He has small gashes along his legs and arms, bruises and welts where he has been burned along his chest, and his trousers have been singed along the hem. He wears no tunic, and his thinness is frightening. He looks nearly skeletal, and his tearful eyes bulge from his small head like saucers full of water.

Get up, he whispers.

I'm trying, I slur, my head in a fog.

I stumble again, trying to use my legs but I'm so tired. So tired. Through the stabbing pain in my shoulder, the blurring world, and my legs wobbling from lack of energy, I pull the life from deep within me, willing my body to move forward. I feel a tickling sensation down my arm, and although I am sweating like a roasting pig and coughing like a dying man, I finally manage to stand. Once on my feet, I find the energy to move, breathing deeply again. I hadn't noticed before, but I was struggling for breath. The smoke must be clearing.

We have to go! he rasps again, his voice wavering with panic.

My shoulder still aches and my chest hurts, but not nearly as bad as before, and I place a hand on the boy's bony shoulder to right myself. I hear yelling now as the guards have come to their senses and the pit bosses are yelling orders. The boy tugs on my ratty tunic, urging me to move, and with a shake of my head to focus on what I should do, I stagger forward. My feet drag at first, but eventually I find the strength to walk. Then even jog. The little boy's legs don't move as far as mine, but the canyon is winding and the path is narrow. I pray to Andraste that we don't run into guards on the way up.

Of course we do, but they scramble past us, intent on getting to the bottom of the quarry. I have no idea why, and no time to think about it, as the boy and I trip over rocks in our stumble upwards. Once we reach the top, the dirt and dust nearly chokes us. It's chaos up here, as many have worked their way out of their ropes and bindings and are now running every which way, scrambling like ants from under a rock. There's screaming; someone has set a fire to one of the tents, and the smoke is billowing up and out, invading my lungs. I cough as I cringe away from the licking flames which leap from tent to tent, eating away at the canvas. Horses that are tied up scream for help; the cows, goats, and chickens squawk and scramble in their pens, trying to escape the fires and the people, some of whom are fighting. Others are looting, many are just running, but all of it is kicking up the dirt so that it blankets the already smoky area like additional fog. This is good for us.

I grab the boy's arm and pull him as fast as my wobbling legs will take us, and I am aiming for the screaming horse. It's a mess, this horse. Its eyes are open wide, its legs shuffling wildly, bucking its head against the rope tied from the fence to its harness right under its chin.

I put out my palms and get low, moving towards the horse and staring right into its eyes. Once I get closer, I see it's a mare, and she whinnies ferociously at me, shaking her head back and forth. I use a soothing tone, moving around to her side… just a little closer… once I grab her reins, she starts to flail. I hold on tight, pulling against her, but she shakes her head, and I stumble forward, unable to help the groan that escapes from me as she pulls on my shoulder. She drags me about a foot before I can get to her, and I throw my hand out at her snout, pinching the spot right between her nostrils. She lets out a small whimper. It's a trick the trainers teach to exert control over a horse. It's painful and I hate doing it, but I need her to listen to me, for both our sakes. I move as swiftly as I can, lifting her chin with the halter.

There's a saddle on the fence nearby, and as I haul it over her back, another stab of pain shoots from my shoulder to my chest, and I cry out. The horse startles at my cry, but I hold onto the bridle.

Hey! I call to the boy. Hey! Help me! I gesture to the buckles on the saddle.

I never thought I would expend so much energy getting onto a horse, but I am tired. I am so tired. The boy jumps up, and he's small enough to fit between my legs. Maker… I am scrawny in this saddle, too. I had no idea.

I pull on the reins, leading the horse around, but once we get out of the dust, the world flattens out into too many choices: which way to go? There is no road. No path. There are tents and tables and fire pits, but beyond the campgrounds for the guards, there is only flat expanse in every direction.

Just go! the boy screams, looking behind us.

I glance back to see two guards emerging from the dust, and they've figured out that we are stealing their horse. I kick my feet into the mare's ribs, and she lurches into motion, bouncing all of us up and down in the most painful gallop of our lives. We don't make it nearly as far as we need to before we notice that we have a pursuer. One of the guards has found a horse, and he is sprinting behind us, gaining ground. His horse is stronger, probably less afraid, and isn't carrying two people on its back. I kick the mare again, but while going faster is necessary, it is also torture. My shoulder sends stabbing pain down my side with every bounce. It's just physical pain, I tell myself. It's preferable to being dead, which is what chases us.

I was hoping to ride for a long time, hoping that guard would give up and turn back, but he apparently has a bow. The arrow sinks into the mare's hind leg and she throws her head back in wailing agony, stumbling over her long limbs, crashing forward into the dirt, and the boy and I go flying. I tuck, trying to protect my ailing shoulder, rolling over and over until I come to an abrupt stop. Somehow, the lack of movement makes my shoulder throb worse.

A flash of yellow crosses my eyes, and a stinging pain that envelopes my entire body follows. The guard has thrown a stinging potion at me, and quite suddenly, I can't move. No! This can't be how it ends! Move, damn it! I feel the potion start to wear off – its effects are really short – and as I start to regain small movement in my limbs, I hear crackles, boots over rock. I manage to turn over, wincing and cringing, to see the point-end of an arrow a foot from my nose.

I have been very angry at the Maker for a long time. I have felt forsaken, abandoned, cursed, but never in my short life did I think he would send me into Andraste's eternal embrace this way. Never did I think I would die in the dirt, my life ended by a coward, by a rapist, by a slaver. But here I am, weakened by circumstance, and thinking about prayer. Does He even listen? Does He ever care? If He did, would I even be here?

But it's not the Maker who shields me, because when the guard grunts, swearing, the top of the boy's head bobs from over the man's shoulder. He's jumped onto the man's back, clinging to him like a monkey. I blink a few times before I realize what's happening, but when I do, I spring into stiff motion, the potion hindering me, but I still launch myself at him, wrapping my good arm around his waist, and the three of us tumble to the hot, rocky earth, landing hard. My shoulder, oh! Andraste preserve me, my shoulder! He fumbles for the knife on his hip, but my hands reach the hilt first, and for a moment we both pull in opposite directions, the pain in my shoulder seems like a faint memory now as I give a primal yell, calling for the strength to overpower this man. The guard cries out, too, but he arches his back and I look up to see the little boy's arms snaked around the man's head, those little fingers pressing into the man's eyes. His momentary pause gives me the just the opportunity I need to wrest the knife free, flip it around in my grip, and thrust the blade into his belly.

It's sharp. It slices cleanly through the thick leather, through his skin and into his thick flesh. A wellspring of deep red liquid bubbles out from his gut, hot around my hand, and his breath hitches, small gurgles escaping between his grunts. His hands fumble around mine, both of which still grasp the hilt with equal pressure until his grip slowly loosens. As he's dying, the pain in my shoulder returns, screaming from my exertions, and it feels like it's on fire from the inside. The guard's arms eventually go slack, and he slumps down, the last of his life pooling beneath him. The little boy starts to cry.

I stare at the slaver for a long moment. He stares back at me. We're both breathless in our individual pain, but this is the way it had to be. This is what we both had to do. This is the business of killing each other.

When I was training for this, they never told me the kind of sounds I would hear as I delivered men into the hands of death. Breaking bones sound like wood splitting, tearing muscles sound like fabric ripping, and the sound of a sword cutting into flesh sounds like nothing.

The man's eyes roll around in his skull, his gaze drifting to the sky as his soft grunts and jagged breaths travel out in the ether. He isn't a good man. His name is Emilio, and he was born in a fishing village. His parents died from some plague, and he was sent to an orphanage at the age of seven where he was recruited by the Crows. He jumped at the opportunity, spending his formative years learning to kill people, to rape women, and to steal from the rich and the poor alike. His only ambition was to satiate his immediate desires. He lived a life without meaning or honor, and now he will die while a small boy and I watch him in disgust.

I feel sick to my stomach. It surprises me how easy it is to kill a man. The first time I ever killed someone was in the Circle Tower – the night I left Starkhaven. I had killed a mage as she tried to flee. She threw several juts of ice at me, and I screamed at her to stop, but when she lunged for me, her staff pointed outwards, I had reacted with a warrior's instinct and sliced my sword right through her belly. Just like I did with this man. One-Cut. Because that's all it took.

I am haunted by her face in my dreams. Her mouth formed an open and bloody question, naïve in its simplicity but I had no answer. After she died, I thought I was going to be sick then, too. But I wasn't. Keis put her hand on my shoulder and said, We need to move. And so I stood up. And we did. I killed a woman and then I stood up and left her body there.

It's a prank, this life; it's a sick joke played upon us all by the Maker himself. We are his pieces, this is his chessboard, and he sits in the center of Heaven staring at his creation, indifferent, and waiting for the pieces to move, to delight and entertain him. Well, my Maker, here is your entertainment: the still-warm corpse right in front of me.

I can't help it. Right in front of this little boy and a dead man, I can feel the hot tears sting my eyes, drawing lines down my dirty face. Is this what it takes? Is this what I have to give? I just want to go home. I just want to go home.

I want to see my mother and father and Goran. I want to see Ari and Flora, and Ruxty. Maybe even Sebastian. But most of all, I want to see my beautiful Sammie.

I want to show her the beautiful plains of the Dales, where the lake waters are so still, you could swear you were looking at two skies. I want to take her to the shores of Antiva, where if you look out, there is nothing on the horizon but where the sea meets the water. I want to show her the night sky out in the middle of nowhere, where the stars are so bright and clustered together so densely, there could be no person capable of counting them all. I want to run my hand down her arm where that mercenary cut her, and wipe it away clean.

The little boy crouches next to me, asking tentatively, Are you okay?

Here I am, injured, in the middle of nowhere and crying. With a little boy. What am I going to do?

After a moment, both of us realize that I haven't answered his question, and he places a tiny hand on my hurt shoulder. I finally speak, saying Don't or something like, but then that strange sensation tickles through me again.

What are—? I don't need to finish the sentence. I know what's he's doing. He's pouring healing magic into me. Just as he did in the quarry when I first hurt my shoulder. He's a mage.

As soon as I realize it, I push him away from me, and he stumbles backwards in the dirt. Oh, Andraste in the heavens, this is another of the Maker's cruel jokes isn't it?

Don't touch me, I yell reactively. Get back!

I stare at him, thinking about all those times I prayed to Andraste and the Maker to watch over me, to protect me in the swamp and the Dales and the quarry. During all of those horrors that I witnessed, the beatings, the slavers, the tortures, how I prayed to them to get me through it. I start to wonder if any of it, ever, was their doing, or was it me? Did I get myself through that? Were they ever watching over me? Was I a fool to think that they were? What kind of Maker would free me from the swamps only to deliver me into the hands of slavers? Who would free me from slavers, but put me in the company of a little mage boy?

I won't hurt you, the boy whimpers through his sobs, crying with renewed enthusiasm.

You're a mage, I say, trying to still my shaking hands. I try to scoot away from him, and find that my shoulder hurts a lot less than it used to.

Please! He wails, drawing out the word into a plea.

He breaks down, his shoulders shaking and his face scrunched up, turning red. I have never seen a more pathetic creature in all my life. His watery voice is torture, but he's a mage! A mage! He could be a demon! Another damned demon, and I can't do this again! Don't make me do this again! Is it my fate to die at the hands of a demon? Did the dragon in the swamp cheat me out of the death that I was supposed to have? Is that why the Maker has led this little boy to me? To kill me? But between his emaciated frame and his utter sorrow, I can't help the feelings that course through me: guilt, compassion, resignation.

Stop crying, I say, holding my hand out. Stop crying. Come on.

He tries to catch his breath. His howling has given him hiccups and I am sure he has cried all the water out of his body. If a demon doesn't claim him, I'm sure dehydration will. I want to run away, leaving him here because he's not my problem, but lying adjacent to the guilt of leaving a boy alone in the middle of nowhere near a slaver camp is my fear that he isn't really human. That he's something much worse.

After a moment, he lifts his eyes to meet mine. Those eyes… they give me a shiver, and we're in a desert. It's so hot, the ground is likely burning our legs.

How do I know you're not maleficar? I ask him warily, and he seems confused by the word. I clarify, Are you a blood mage? Do you use your own blood in magic?

No, he promises earnestly.

But I insist and ask, How do I know?

I'm not! he says. He swallows hard, licks his lips, and blinks. He's trying to calm down.

I have no idea what a possessed mage looks like. I have never seen one. At least, I can't remember ever seeing one. Maybe if I get him to talk, I'll see something, recognize a sign or something. Maybe it's because of his eyes, which are terrible, but I don't like looking at him.

What's your name? I ask.

Liam.

Liam, I say. We're out in the open, and that's bad.

He nods, asking, Where are we going?

We. I am so screwed.

I finally get a look around. Which way to go? I have no idea where we are, but the tracks in the dirt suggest where we came from. The guard's horse is milling about near the mare, who is whining pathetically on the ground. Damn it, the horse. I forgot about her. But I get an idea. Maybe if I watch him do some magic, I'll be able to see if he uses his blood. It's a weak test, but it's all I've got.

Can you help the horse? I ask. I mean for him to heal her.

Yes, he says. But… I feel tired.

He's weak. He must not have much energy left for healing, but whatever he has will have to do.

I approach the male horse, which is standing uncertainly, as if waiting for someone to ride him, and I grab his reins. Once I get close to the mare, I turn to Liam.

I say, When I pull out the arrow, you need to heal her leg, okay? This horse – I point to the male horse – might get scared so I will have to keep him from running away. But you need to keep your hands on her leg. Got it?

He nods, his face full of determination. I kneel down on one knee, one hand on the reins of the male horse, the other hand wrapped around the shaft of the arrow. He leans down too, both of his tiny hands on the horse's leg where the shaft is sticking out from her flesh. Her brown coat is matted with blood, which is now caked on Liam's hands.

I say, Hold her leg down. I'm going to pull pretty hard. Ready?

He gives a quick nod, and then I yank, hard and fast and the suctioning sound that the arrow makes as it leaves her leg is yet another sound that they never tell you about. The mare lets loose a shriek and the stud rears wildly. I grasp his reins with both hands, working very hard to keep him under control, but when I finally turn around, the boy is still crouched by the mare, and she is visibly relaxed.

Did it work? I ask, still stumbling around, trying to pull the stud into submission.

Yep, he says, beaming at me.

Something changes in his eyes. They change color. They become bright, filled with light and hope and, in turn, I am filled with fascination and warmth. I can't help it; I laugh. It's a joyful laugh, washed with relief and optimism. After a moment, I calm down and regain my faculties. My mood changed so suddenly. It felt so normal. So natural. The realization frightens me. It's his eyes.

My voice is quiet when I ask him, How do you do that? How did the guards not know what you are?

His smile falters, and he says, I don't know.

I remember the feeling I used to get – still get, whenever he looks at me. Even now; those creepy eyes and that feeling of dread, and how every person in that camp seemed to want to crawl away from him. He infects others with his feelings… that's an odd talent to have.

The horse I have worked to control is now calm, but I never look away from the boy when I ask, Did you cause the explosion at the mine?

He doesn't answer audibly, but he doesn't need to. Every other part of his body answers for him. Even under his scrapes and bruises and burns, his body is screaming a resounding Yes.

I blow through my lips, running a hand over my face and looking around us at the endless expanse in every direction, and then I look back to him and give him a small nod, saying, Thanks.

He lets out a giggle, small and hopeful. It strikes me how innocent he is. He is so young, new to the world and all the horrors that it can produce, but he's already seen so much of that. I wonder how that has shaped him, how that's damaged him.

I ask, Can you ride her by yourself?

He looks down to the horse, and she blusters through her lips, too. He says, I think so.

I steer the horses to each other, helping the mare up. We are fortunate that we have both of them, but I don't know if I can keep us alive. All four of us need water. We need food. We need shelter from the blistering sun.

I take what I can from the dead guard; his sword, bow, arrows, belt and jacket, shoes, and the leathers and tunic that I slashed through. I don't like wearing a dead man's clothes, let alone where the bloodstains are still fresh, but we need them to survive. I let the boy have my tunic, belting it at the waist, and I wear the bloody one, strapping on the leathers, too. I also give him the bow. He can't be any worse at it than me. The guard had no pack, no canteen, no pouches or dried beef. He was leaving the camp to chase us down – he only grabbed his weapons. Hopefully, we can ride fast enough to find some shade, escape the wide-open desert and into a forest or the mountains, somewhere where we can find cover.

I hope this isn't a stupid decision, teaming up with a little boy – and a mage at that. I hope that I can keep us both alive. I hope that I can defend us both from the evils of the world where I have thus far failed. Another part of me is cursing myself for my own stupidity, because this can't possibly end well. But he's already saved me. Twice. Aside from that, I cannot in good conscience abandon a small boy out here. I just can't.

He may be a demon, he may not be. We have the rest of the journey to find that out, and hopefully this time, we can avoid little Antivan hermits and demented apostates, and stay off of well-traveled paths. I will be wary of people and only when I am in sight of Starkhaven's golden gates, which tower above the city's walls like beacons of hope, will I allow myself to relax. But until then, I must tread carefully.

We'll either make it or we won't. And it won't be the Maker that guides us. It'll be me.